


extra, extra

by kythen



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Self-Esteem Issues, is this what they call a bonding moment, self-destructive behaviour
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-05
Updated: 2017-08-05
Packaged: 2018-12-11 12:30:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11714430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kythen/pseuds/kythen
Summary: Prompt:“Because nobody cares about me!”





	extra, extra

**Author's Note:**

> For this [ask](http://kythen.tumblr.com/post/158673213314/prompt-7-and-klance).
> 
> This is a couple of months old but in honour of Voltron season 3 I'm throwing this on here. Happy VLD Season 3 y'all!

“Why did you do that?”

“Go away, Keith,” Lance says, tired and quieter than usual, which is only to be expected considering that he just took an ion blaster to the lion. Blue crackles behind him, his poor girl, her outer surface charred black and her interfaces scrambled. He would have to talk to her later when he is less scrambled himself.

Shiro keeps Keith away from Lance with a firm hand, slinging Lance’s right arm over his shoulder while Hunk takes his left. “Whatever it is, save it for later. We need to get Lance to a healing pod.”

As Shiro and Hunk pull Lance away from the hangar and in the direction of what he hopes is a cushy healing pod, Lance hopes that Keith really doesn’t save it for later.

\---

“Why did you do that?” Keith asks a day later, right after Lance wobbles out of the healing pod and into his room, hoping for some non-vertical rest.

“Whatever it is, I didn’t do it,” Lance says automatically, scowling as Keith waltzes into his room right behind him. “Hey, who gave you the permission to come in here?”

“That blast was headed straight for me.” Keith demands, ignoring Lance. “Why did you jump in the way?”

“It was an accident. We were in the heat of battle and I didn’t see the blast coming. Not everything is about you, hotshot.”

“You yelled my name before jumping in.”

“Yeah, well, I yelled a lot of things then.” Lance crosses his arms over his chest. “What part of ‘the heat of battle’ don’t you get?”

Keith deflates slightly but he still looks unconvinced, and Lance doesn’t care. He turns his back on Keith and crawls into his bed, hoping that Keith gets the message and goes away as he turns onto his side and throws the covers over his head.

\---

“How does Zarkon keep finding us?” Hunk wails over their communications channel as the lions leave the castle and plunge straight into the thick of battle.

“You don’t suppose GPS tracking is a thing in space, do you?” Lance answers him, staring out of Blue’s windscreen at the rows and rows of Galra ships lined up before them, ready to take them out.

He barrel rolls out of the way as they start shooting, prompting Blue to start firing back as he weaves in between the ships. The other paladins spread out, cutting a swarth through the fleet, downing row after row. It is painfully slow progress and Lance’s movements feel sluggish from having to do this too often in too short a time. Just how is Zarkon tracking them down?

A shot clips his side, sending Blue and him spiralling away and Lance shakes himself out of his daze, forcing himself to concentrate. He freezes the wall of ships closing in on him in one fell swoop before he moves out of the thick of battle, trying to get a big picture of how the fight is going.

He sees Hunk slam into one of the bigger ships, denting it badly enough that a single shot demolishes it easily after that. Shiro and Keith are fighting back-to-back again, their black and red lions a blur as they take down ships left and right. Pidge is by herself on the fringe of the battlefield, plants erupting out of the ships near her. The one closest to her bursts into a fireball, spiralling towards the Green Lion and Lance expects her to dodge nimbly out of the way.

But her lion stalls—maybe she is as exhausted as he is—and Lance _fears_ for her, pushing his lion into action before the rest of him catches up with that fear. He is closer to the fireball than he is to the Green Lion and he doesn’t think, ramming Blue right into the fireball with an apology just as the metal cracks and gives way under the pressure of an internal explosion.

\---

“Why did you do that?”

Keith doesn’t even give him the luxury of reaching his room before he starts again. He is the first thing Lance sees as he stumbles out of the healing pod, his body tight and uncomfortable after the accelerated healing process. Lance just wants to go back to his room and sleep but he can’t, not with Keith blocking his path, looking like he hadn’t slept in ages.

Lance runs a hand through his hair, gross and unwashed right out of battle, before attempting a glare at Keith. It probably comes out sad and weak and tired because Lance is sad and weak and tired and all he wants is to lie down horizontally and not get up for a while.

“What do you want, Keith?” Lance faces him anyway, squaring up the best he can.

It doesn’t help much as Keith says, “I want to know why you keep throwing yourself into harm’s way.”

Lance flinches and Keith catches that, and of course he does since he is standing right in front of Lance.

“I’m not—”

“Don’t think I haven’t noticed,” Keith says, his voice low. “Shiro probably would have noticed if he wasn’t so busy with the Black Lion. You keep taking hits meant for the others, for us. What’s your deal?”

“What’s my deal?” Lance repeats, a quiet anger smouldering in him, flaring up past the deep-set fatigue in his body and past the shit feeling that has been bogging him down for days or weeks or months. “Have you ever heard of teamwork?”

Keith’s mouth flattens out into an unconvinced line. “Not the kind you’ve been displaying out there.”

Lance throws his arms up in the air. “What do you want from me? I’m fine, the others are fine, everything’s fine in the end.”

“You can’t keep taking damage like that,” Keith throws back in his face hotly, flaring up in response to Lance’s sudden outburst. “You go straight into the healing pod right after every battle and you think that’s _fine_?”

“Why do you care?” Lance snarls at him, taking a step forward and getting right in Keith’s face. “You do that all the time too—running off on your own, fighting battles you can’t win, trying to rescue Shiro on your own. What makes what you’re doing any different from me?”

Keith doesn’t back down, meeting Lance’s eyes squarely. “It’s different because I don’t end up a step away from death like you do all the time!”

“Oh, so that’s what it is, isn’t it?” Lance is shouting now and he can’t stop all the bitterness and self-loathing from spilling out of him as he continues, “You’re better than me, aren’t you? You’ve got it all covered because you’re the ace!”

“That’s not it!” Keith grits out, frustrated. “What, you think doing all of this is going to make you a better pilot somehow? A better paladin?”

“It’ll make me feel better about myself, maybe” —Lance slams a hand against his chest, right over his aching heart— “because nobody cares about me!”

His words ring out around the room, hanging sharp in the air between them, and Lance shrinks back as the gravity of his words sinks back into him. He didn’t mean to say that. It just slipped out from some part of his conscious-unconscious and now he can’t take it back. He can’t make Keith unhear all the gross, insecure feelings he has been having about himself.

“You meant that,” Keith says, serious, his voice far softer than before.

“I…” Lance takes a step away from Keith and Keith reaches out to grab his arm, as if sensing that he is going to run. “I…”

“Is that what you really think of us?” Keith asks him, a mix of confusion and concern creasing his brows. “You think we don’t care about you?”

“That’s… That’s not it.” Lance exhales and it comes out in a sad, deflated puff of air. “It’s just that, y'know, the rest of you guys have your thing all figured out. Shiro’s the leader, Hunk’s a great mechanic and an even greater guy, Pidge’s our ace hacker. I mean, even you…” Lance clears his throat. “But me? I’ve got nothing. I can’t contribute to the team. I’m just, just a seventh wheel or something.”

He is rambling, he knows this, and he wants to stop but he finds that once he starts he just can’t. He can’t imagine how Keith is going to look at him after this or how he is even going to respond now.

“You’re not a seventh wheel,” Keith finally says. “You’re a leg.”

“ _Excuse me?_ ”

“You know, like Voltron’s leg. Our leg.”

“Wait wait wait wait wait.” Lance shakes his head and looks at Keith incredulously. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

“I don’t know,” Keith admits. “Maybe? Is it helping?”

“I don’t know?” Lance says blankly. “In any other situation, that would make a great joke but now I’m just… uh?”

“Well, at least you’re not feeling sorry for yourself anymore.” Keith lets go of Lance’s arm and Lance suddenly remembers that Keith has been holding on to him this whole time.

“I wasn't—” Lance stops himself.

“You totally were.” Keith crosses his arms. “I don’t know where you got the crazy idea that none of us care about you and you taking all the hits for us was supposed to help in some way.” He looks straight into Lance’s eyes. “But just stop.”

Lance drops his gaze, scrutinising his hands, freshly patched up out of the healing pod, as he admits quietly, “I don’t know if I can.”

“Then I’ll stop you,” Keith says, raising an eyebrow when Lance glances up at him, startled. “That’s what teammates are for, aren’t they?”

Lance never thought a day would come where he would be grateful to Keith but here it is and it’s… a strange feeling. His body goes limp, like all the wind has gone right out of him. He feels exhausted and his head hurts from all the shouting. Keith offers him a shoulder silently and Lance leans on him without complaining for once, too tired to care.

“Keith?” Lance starts awkwardly as they make their way out of the pod room in slow, careful steps. “Uh… About this…”

“You just came out of an alien, medically-induced sleep,” Keith says blandly. “I had no idea what you were talking about after you came out of the pod so there’s no reason to tell anyone what you said.”

“Thanks, Keith.”

“Just,” Keith adds, his eyes facing forward, not looking at Lance, “take care of yourself, Lance.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> Find me here: [tumblr](http://kythen.tumblr.com) / [twitter](http://twitter.com/catcrowcalls)


End file.
